Man Admits Killing Prison Volunteer

Man Admits Strangling Woman

Raymond Ludden formally admitted Monday that he strangled prison volunteer Nancy Babb in 1989, consigning himself to a life behind bars but avoiding a trial that could have led to the electric chair.

Ludden, who now has two murder convictions to show for his 36 years, seemed almost eager to accept the plea bargain at Hartford Superior Court. He interrupted a clerk's recitation of the murder charge with an abrupt "Guilty!"

One reason for Ludden's impatience may be that the plea makes it possible for him to live out his days in an out-of-state prison. He is a pariah in Connecticut penal circles because he killed a prison volunteer, and other inmates are said to despise him for jeopardizing a program that provides precious contact with the outside world.

Ludden already had told police that he choked Babb, who was 64, to death with a telephone cord. Monday, he admitted it to Judge Richard A. Damiani. Ludden, always pudgy, appeared to have put on considerable weight in prison, and stood before the judge with his Correction Department khaki shirt imperfectly tucked into the straining waistband of his pants.

Under the plea agreement with Assistant State's Attorney John H. Malone, Ludden will be sentenced to 60 years in prison on top of the sentence of 17 years to life he received for the 1974 slaying of Mary Joan Campbell, a 24-year-old with whom he worked at the Union Hardware plant in Torrington.

Babb befriended Ludden when he was in prison and allowed him to visit her after he was paroled. It was during a visit to her Hartford apartment in February 1989 that Ludden, in the midst of a cocaine binge, strangled her. He later told police he was feeling "fidgety."

Malone said the state might have had trouble proving the factors necessary to send Ludden to the electric chair. "The nature of the act itself was not accompanied by any other acts that would fall into the category of cruel, heinous and depraved," Malone said. Ludden's record of mental illness, as well as evidence that he was high on cocaine, also might have qualified as mitigating factors, Malone said.

Under state law, if even one mitigating factor is proved, the defendant cannot be executed.

"It's felt no useful purpose would come from attempted prosecution on the death penalty," Malone said. "It's simply not in the cards, as far as the law is concerned."

Babb was a volunteer in the Volunteer Sponsor Program of the Connecticut Prison Association. Gordon Bates, executive director of the association, said the nonprofit group took no position on whether the state should seek the death penalty for Ludden. "I'm quite happy with life in prison, personally," Bates said.

Bates said that Babb's death, the first such incident in the program's 30 years, had been "disquieting" for other volunteers, but that none had left. "But it has slowed down recruitment of new volunteers," Bates said.

Ludden also admitted Monday that he committed a burglary in Goshen and two robberies in Suffield during the same week he killed Babb, including one in which Babb's former husband was threatened at knifepoint, robbed and tied up with a telephone cord.

During the court session Monday, Damiani took note of efforts by defense lawyers M. Fred DeCaprio and Stephen Moran to get Ludden transferred to an out-of-state prison. But the judge said the plea bargain did not include any promises by the state to do so.

In response to a question from the judge, Ludden said he had taken Thorazine, a medication used to treat certain mental disorders. But Ludden said the drug did not prevent him from understanding what was going on.

"Where are you?" Damiani asked.

"Superior Court," Ludden replied.

"What did you just do?" the judge said.

"Pleaded guilty to charges," Ludden said.

DeCaprio said that technically, Ludden might be eligible for parole sometime in his old age. But realistically, the combination of a 60-year sentence and an earlier life sentence makes release very unlikely, DeCaprio said. Ludden is to be sentenced Jan. 10.